The seven colonists were seated at uneven intervals around a large oval table in a clear space on the Irisward side of the dome that surrounded the CM. Packets of mandarines d'ortolans , a dish adapted from Escoffier , were passed around in silence except for the slithering arpeggios of a Beethoven string quartet. They began to eat, sparingly. It was delicious. The tiny, simulated buntings, barely more than morsels of meat, were nestled in an aspic delicately flavored by the essence of tangerine. The meal had been prepared to coincide with the return of the absent trio. They were now more than two hours overdue. After considerable discussion, in which it was pointed out that, if anything serious had gone wrong, it was too late for a rescue, they had decided to continue with the meal. Beth sat back uncomfortably in her chair. In the last few days the colony had fallen into a state of disorganized apathy. With the absence of Sealock and Krzakwa, a vacuum had come to fill that place in their hearts where some optimism for the future should have been. John had totally abdicated from any pretense at leadership and the changes that she thought she'd seen begun at the orgy had dwindled into lethargy. She tasted a delicately flavored bunting and sighed.
"Shall we listen to some more stuff from the second millennium?" asked Cornwell.
"Sure," said Demogorgon, raising a goblet of white burgundy. "What next?" He didn't feel any of this in his soul, but . . . why cry now? The time would come, on its own.
"I'd rather we didn't," said Beth. "I think the time has come to start discussing a few things. John, you know, I remember how eloquent you were about starting this colony . . . back on Earth. Now that we're here, and the time for a real start has come, you sit back and watch. When you do talk, it's all generalities. What's happening to you?"
The man looked at her and at the others in turn. His face flushed. "I'm sorry," he said, looking at the table. "It's true— I had great hopes for this colony. But it's not going to work out that way. We're a failure already, barely two weeks along. All that's here is what we brought. I was wrong to think that something else could be created. I am responsible." He paused, then went on: "We have our chance to fail, now. When the USEC ship comes in a few months, those of us who must go back separately will be able to do so. Maybe we should call it quits." Somehow, he couldn't look at their faces anymore. Ariane reached across the table suddenly and put her hand on John's. "Come on," she said, "give us a chance."
Beth could almost see the strength draining out of the musician. She felt sick, watching him fade so fast. She looked at the others and saw that they seemed to be straightening up, as if awakening. It was as if John's admission, his self-condemnation, were giving them some kind of strength. What was it: some kind of contrariness? Angrily, she looked at John, saw him raise his eyes . . . She waited for him to look at her, expected it, but his gaze locked with Methol's.
Cornwell took the woman's hand and stroked it. "What do you suggest?" Ariane stared at him for a long moment, dark eyes impenetrable, then she said, "No one's questioning the technical feasibility of this colony. We have what we need to live here, and we have a lot left to do; a lot to keep us busy. . . ."
"But what about you?" he demanded. "Will you be content to spend the rest of your life stuck out here with people like us? Have you thought about what that means?"
"We all thought about that. Thoroughly," she said. She looked around at the others. "The responsibility for our emotions lies within each of us. We knew what we were getting into. . . . God damn it, John, you seem to think that the rest of us are powerless! We know we're going to have to cope with this, somehow. That's how human societies survive, and it's a kind of love, maybe the only kind!" She let go of his hand and sat back.
"Ariane's right," said Vana.
John stared at them all, his brow pinched. He nodded slowly.
Beth felt relief flooding her. "What about the things that you talked about?" she asked. "What happened to thosenotions about group consciousness that seemed so important?" It wasn't pushing. She really wanted to know.
"I don't know. Lately, I've come to think that Downlink Rapport would have only bad effects. It represents a sort of total vulnerability, and in the presence of anything but total good will ..."
"You're talking about Brendan, aren't you?" Ariane had a trace of masked anger in her voice.
"Well . . . yes. You keep saying that I don't understand him. Maybe so. But, until I do, I think I'm right to be suspicious. I think he might use it to his own ends."
Demogorgon looked away from them, not wanting to listen any longer. The worst of it, he thought, is the damned fool is probably right. Just because I love Brendan, I don't have to be blind to his faults. I know how he'd act. . . . He knows that his laughter hurts people, and that makes him laugh even more. Jana suddenly looked up from her contemplative silence and said, "Speaking of the Devil . . . If I read the data from my local seismic monitors correctly, there's something rolling toward us across the ice. I guess they're back."
In his turn, the Arab felt a flood of relief.
As they pulled up to the entrance to the habitat dome, Brendan braked the car to a halt. He shook Krzakwa and said, "Hey! We're here." He turned off the engine and stretched. It was great to be back in touch with Shipnet again. There was a moment of reintegration, and then Sealock performed some quick computational housekeeping to make certain that his work-buffers and program systems were functioning correctly. When they'd pressurized their suits and were ready to face the outside, they left the car. 60vet was no worse for the wear—though there were a few nodules of ice lodged in the grille from an unfortunate collision that had occurred on the way back when, bored by the ruler-flat terrain, they had all fallen asleep. Predictably, they had crashed into the only impediment in a hundred square kilometers, an ice boulder thrown from some large impact on the farside. It had taken a startled moment to determine that the sharp lurch and grinding wheels were not some dire mechanical failure.
They entered the access module between the domes, waited for the small enclosure to fill with nitrogen, empty, and then refill with air. Going through the airlock, they passed through the p-curtain leading into the transparent CM dome.
Brendan's depressurized suit fell from him like an old skin. Ridged, beltlike pressure marks embossed his flesh, distorting the muscle lines. Krzakwa followed his example, but Prynne kept his suit tight, a heroic costume. They went around to the other side of the CM, where the rest of the colonists were standing around a table, as though impatiently waiting.
Beth had noticed an immediate change in John, the moment he knew that the others were back, manifested by a tightening in his manner, a closing down. Perhaps they'd been on the verge of a breakthrough, perhaps not, but he'd been about to verbalize his fears, at least. Now she could see that it was Sealock who was bedeviling him. Sealock alone. She'd had some inkling that this might be the case, but now it was plain.
Demogorgon spoke first: "How was the trip?"
Sealock grimaced. "Good ride. Bad scenery. The edge of the mare is no big deal." Hu looked up sharply. "The edge? I thought it was agreed that you would stay clear of the volatile regions until a complete survey could be taken. The ocellus-highland interface is . . ." Tem held up a hand. "Don't worry, Jana. We didn't do any, ah—what did you call it?— wheelies in the fucking neon."
Prynne, smiling, was saying, "We all slept through the last hundred kilometers yesterday. We would've been back sooner if Tem's foot hadn't fallen off the gas pedal."